A Day Of Remembrance
by crazed spyromaniac
Summary: Confusion embraces Ralph as he remembers what a friend once told him.


A Day Of Remembrance  
  
  
  
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from Lord of the Flies.  
Spoilers: the ending of the book  
  
I know you will get off the island. . .   
  
Those words haunted me. Simon had spoken them while we were on the island. The island, that dreaded place. We were on that island for almost a year, I think it was. I am not sure, nor will I ever be sure.  
How Simon knew that I alone would be able to get off the island unscathed always brought question to my mind. I guess it was because of my desire to be rescued so badly, or maybe Simon just knew it.  
Simon was always like that, though. He always knew something that the rest of us did not. He did not like to talk to large crowds, which was understandable, some people are just shy. That night, when he stumbled into the hunters ring, he knew who or what the beast was.   
The day that Simon was killed hurt Piggy and I like an arrow to the heart. We were shocked, amazed and afraid of what they would do next. Jack and his hunters were savages, there was no denying that.  
They did not act like they cared at all for what they had done, and I know they did not. They ambushed us the next night, because they needed fire to cook their pig. They took Piggy's glasses, and without them Piggy and I could not survive. So we set out to find Jack. Jack had made his headquarters at Castle rock. When we got there, we were stopped, by the "guard". It always amazes me how they took this so seriously. When I told them that we were there to take back Piggy's glasses, Jack had scoffed.   
We started to fight, and Piggy, blinded without his glasses began to shout questions in fear. I was busy and could not answer them. Soon Jack and I stopped fighting; and he ordered that Samneric be taken away.   
I am not clear on what happened next, but I saw the boulder hit Piggy. He was so surprised, he didn't even have a chance to react. I saw him fall to his death, and then his body taken out into the sea.   
I was alone, I knew this. The two people that actually understood why I was trying to keep a fire lit, and have shelter, the two people that had always helped me, were gone. There was no way to bring them back.  
Vaguely, I remember the chase, of Jack and his hunters. The one thing I do remember was the pig's skull on the double sharpened spear. I knocked it over, and watched it break in to two parts. That was when I knew that I would never be part of Jack's society, part of his tribe. In a way, I was still civilized, I could still follow the laws and rules of being around people.   
When the soldier on the beach found us, he laughed jokingly at us playing around. At first he did not believe me when I said that two of us were dead. He saw the look on my face, and knew I was not joking. I don't think I could do that again, at least not for awhile.   
He took us back to the ship; they had to lock Jack and his tribe in a cabin. The captain said that the rest were not mentally well to fit back into society. I understood what he meant, I had known that for a long while; after all was it not I who just ran away from them to stay alive. In a way I was their pig, something that they could chase and kill. But in reality I was the first pig that Jack had tried to kill but could not. I was the pig that got away.  
The soldier, who came onto the island asked me to tell him why the others were behaving like they were. So I told him. I told him about the fire on the mountain, the beast, the hunters, the pigs, Simon and how he died, Piggy, and the chase that had nearly claimed my life.  
He was appalled at their behavior. I knew that he would be, I mean who wouldn't be? When we arrived back in England, even though the ship was American, I was told about why we were not rescued earlier.  
It was said that the war happened right over the island. They had thought of us to be dead, that we did not survive the crash, as they had found the remained of the plane. A pilot had done an emergency ejection out of his plane, and had landed on our island, at least that's what they think happened.  
I nodded my head silently; the beast on the mountain top was really the decomposing body of a pilot from the war. Simon's screams echoed in my head, and suddenly they made sense.  
I was reunited with my mother and father, both cried tears of joy. They were just happy to see their little boy again. Piggy's death had already reached his aunt, but she came to the sea port anyway.   
I saw her standing by herself, alone and almost instantly I knew who she was. Her tired face was wrinkled and stained with time. Her eyes held grief and glistened with unshed tears.  
I made my way to her. She looked at me, with her sad eyes but gave me a small smile.  
"Are you... Well, he never did tell us his name, but we called him Piggy. Are you Piggy's Auntie?" I asked, as politely as I could.  
She nodded her head, and I gave her a small smile, as I spoke again.   
"I was Piggy's friend, Ralph. He was very smart. . . I was there when he died. He was very brave."  
"Brave?" She had asked.  
I nodded my head and told her what he did. The tears in her eyes by that time had shed, but I was not sure if they were because she was happy or because of grief.   
She thanked me and left. My father put his arm around me, and led me to our car. My parents chattered about all that had happened in the time that I was gone. It was almost as if I had gone on a very long vacation, a horrible terrifying vacation.   
But now that it was over I was grateful; but at times my mind wonders over to the night Simon died, and the day he told me I would be the one that would certain to leave the island.   
  
Hands gently closed the weather-beaten leather bound book. The book was taken back to the house library where it was found, and slid back into place, with the other leather bound books.  
The blonde woman quietly shut the door, slightly shaken up at the account of what had happened to her son all those years ago. 


End file.
